Why Scotland must vote "Yes" in the independence referendum

Scotland should take the plunge and make the step into a future that they will determine themselves.Getty Images/iStockphoto

The flood of crocodile tears shed in London over possible Scottish independence would overflow the Thames.

The pontificating of the editorial writers and the pundits is such that one would believe a disaster of monumental proportions is about to hit the British island.

Prime Minister David Cameron has led the sky is falling brigade, galloping off to Scotland with several of his cabinet and opposition leaders after it became obvious that he realizes his very political survival is on the line if the yes to independence vote is carried.

The London love-fest for Scotland is driven by intense self-interest. Cameron will likely lose his job and Labor may never rule a truncated United Kingdom.

Without Scotland, the Labor leaders now rushing there to pledge their undying love know that they will find it very hard to muster a majority in Parliament.

There is but one Tory MP north of the border and Labor have a major numerical advantage in any election as a result. They would lose that if Scotland votes for independence. Scotland has been a wasteland for the Tories since the Thatcher era, but Labour knows without those Scottish seats they could be politically dead-ended.

Then there are the captains of industry who profess great insight into what will happen if Scotland separates.

A wasteland worthy of the TS Eliot poem of that title seems the considered view as the British pound quivers and falls with news of the close elections.

It is obvious now that all this could have been avoided if Cameron had offered a wider self-government to Scotland within the U.K., but he insisted on being too clever by half and making it an all or nothing proposition.

Now the polls show the vote is too close to call thanks to a brilliant campaign by Alex Salmond, head of the Scottish Nationalist Party who has run rings around the combined London leadership.

Salmond has done so by appealing to Scottish pride and ability to run their own affairs better than they are run from London.

Salmond would not be all that different from many regional politicians in England who see all too clearly that the concentration of wealth in London and its exurbs has been at the cost of the rest of Britain.

Rather like the European Union where countries like Ireland at the geographical periphery are first to suffer, the Scots may have had enough of being outsiders.

It seems such an obvious opportunity for a people to grasp their own future that the Scots would surely be remiss not to do so.

Independence does not presage a worse relationship, only a more equal one with England. The Irish 26 counties known as the Free State successfully separated in 1922 and became a Republic a quarter century later.

The Irish state had no flow of oil or large indigenous industry such as the Scots have, nor an educated workforce at that point, but they have fared well on the world stage. Scotland surely would too.

Scotland should take the plunge and make the step into a future that they will determine themselves.

Either way the independence bid has shaken up British politics to the core and forced a necessary focus on where power and wealth is currently focused. For that we can all be thankful.

Scotland should take the plunge and make the step into a future that they will determine themselves.Getty Images/iStockphoto